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Business professor earns Fulbright grant to Germany

Destination Germany—Barry A. Friedman, a professor in the SUNY Oswego School of Business’ management and marketing department, recently won a Fulbright Specialist grant to teach and do research this summer at the Hamburg School of Business Administration, where he has taught intensive one-week seminars twice in the past.

SUNY Oswego management and marketing faculty member Barry A. Friedman, an accomplished researcher specializing in business organizational behavior and human resource management, recently earned a Fulbright Specialist grant to teach this summer at a business school in Germany.

Friedman will serve for a month with the Hamburg School of Business Administration, teaching a business ethics and corporate social responsibility seminar, collaborating with counterparts on research projects and sharing effective teaching techniques. He also will solidify a partnership between the SUNY Oswego School of Business and the school in Germany, providing opportunities for graduate students to take part in the prestigious summer program there.

“It’s an honor,” said Friedman, who joined Oswego’s faculty in 2003 following a 25-year career in human resource management at Exxon Mobil and Xerox. “Not that many Fulbrights are awarded. I was very happy and humbled to represent both Oswego and my country in Germany.”

The highly competitive J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Program, administered by the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and its Council for International Exchange of Scholars, provides grants to promote links between U.S. scholars and professionals and their counterparts at host institutions. Fulbright recipients are distinguished scholars and professionals worldwide who are leaders in the educational, economic, social and cultural lives of their countries.

Fulbright Specialist grants provide recipients with flexibility to pursue projects that work best with current academic or professional commitments that may prohibit long-term projects.

International opportunities

Friedman said this will mark his seventh trip to Germany, though his previous visits have been to teach intensive, one-week seminars in Hamburg in the north and Kempten in the south. He would like to see Berlin and Dusseldorf on this trip, though the academic pace is fast and responsibilities are many.

The vetting process for the Fulbright grant took months, followed by more months identifying and gaining acceptance at a host school and in a host country. Friedman had taught an intensive seminar at the Hamburg School of Business Administration the year before last, and again this winter break.

“The Hamburg opportunity helps the School of Business and I achieve important goals to provide international opportunities for students and faculty,” Friedman said. “HSBA offers an MBA and undergraduate degrees—it’s really an excellent school, and they are elated to have a Fulbright scholar.”

Friedman has taken on global academic travel throughout his career at Oswego. “I have a desire to learn about different cultures,” he said, noting that other teaching and research opportunities have taken him to Singapore, Turkey, China and Japan.

Among Friedman’s areas of research interest are business ethics, human resource management and entrepreneurship. A past recipient of both the Oswego President’s Award for Teaching Excellence and the Provost’s Award for Scholarly and Creative Activity, his publications have appeared in such peer-reviewed journals as the Journal of Applied Psychology, Personnel Journal and the Journal of Applied Business and Economics. Among his numerous conference presentations are those at the Academy of Management and the Eastern Academy of Management.